


lucus a non lucendo

by torches



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-02
Updated: 2006-03-02
Packaged: 2017-10-09 16:29:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/89420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/torches/pseuds/torches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fitting into the cracks of a shaken canon - after Infinite Crisis, but before the One Year Later status quo had fully solidified, leaving the events of that missing year malleable and uncertain - two survivors meet, three months into the year that was, in changed circumstances and changed surroundings.</p><p>Some things don't change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	lucus a non lucendo

It's been three months since he started settling into New York, and the rhythm of the streets at night is almost beginning to feel   


_cold nights flying through the air tethered to Gotham gargoyles_

  
familiar, like   


_Bruce_

  
home, like   


_cold hard concrete_

  
a place to live.. He smirks, shoots off a zipline, and leaps wildly into the air, reckless,   


_so different from Dick_

  
free.

The gun on his hip, in a holster, on a - yes, a fucking utility belt, if you have to ask - stopped feeling like a weight a few days after the scars on his neck turned white.

He spots them in a small neighborhood in Brooklyn, three tough-guy types, all swagger, moving in on the target smooth and slick. The woman won't ever know what hit her, but Jason does. She's old enough Jason knows that living in this neighborhood's the best the system's gonna let her do at this point, and he doesn't bother swallowing his rage. The first thug isn't expecting an interruption by costume, and gets a black-and-blue boot to the face for his ignorance as Jason slams into him with enough force to leave an indentation on the skin, at least for a few moments. The next guy lunges for Jason, aiming for a headlock, so Jason moves inside the guy's range and pummels the air out of the guy's lungs, smirking at how great of an idea those reinforced gloves really were. The other thug, the bastard, runs away.

Jason gives the woman a quick smile, and then he's up sharing oxygen with the New York skyline again. What brings him down next time is the highly unusual sight of a girl - can't be any older than 25, he thinks - beating the crap out of five assailants already and _winning_. He takes a moment to watch her appreciatively, then lands next to the last assailant, just in time to see him go down. The girl barely pauses, the kick flowing effortlessly into a graceful punch - for a brief moment, something in the back of Jason's head nags at him, something familiar about it - then the blow stops, mere inches from Jason's face, the wind ruffling his hair.

"You didn't move." Not a question.

"Nope, I didn't," says Jason, and he smirks.

"That blow would have broken your nose," she says. She stares at him, her hand still clenched, clawlike, in front of his face.

"Nobody can damage these good looks."

She adjusts her position, and the nagging sensation comes back. "I . . . doubt that." That's when it hits him.

"You used to be Batgirl, didn't you?"

She blinks, then stares back at him, evenly, with the hint of a smile playing on her lips. "We grow into different masks as we grow older. Red Hood."

"Nightwing, now, whether Batman likes it or not." Jason knew Bruce was definitely leaning towards _not_, but Nightwing operated where Nightwing wanted to operate, and besides, Bruce had Dick . . . wherever Dick had vanished to. It's what happens when you grow up on a trapeze instead of the streets. Your feet don't stay planted the way they should.

"Does it fit?" she asks, looking him up and down. She doesn't mean the costume - well, not literally. He thinks about it, seriously, and looks at her, dressed in a trenchcoat and a simple black bodysuit. She looks . . . calm, he thinks, but.

There's a fire that lurks behind her calm grace. A fire he knows because he's seen it and felt it in himself  


_Lazarus_

  
in the cold, gray mornings, when all he can hear is the noise of cars and all he can smell is hot dogs mixed with sewer stench. The need to _do_, to _be_, to feel.

She will never truly belong. Jason can see she's faced that path and made peace with it. He respects that.

He needs to belong to something, though. She probably understands.

"It fits better than the old one," he says.

She nods, and smiles, and touches his hand, and when he shoots the zipline off, he doesn't even need to ask if she's coming because she's already reaching her arms around his shoulders and hanging on, her breath hot in his ear, and then the New York skyline is open before them, the streets below a rushing wave of noisy life.

It's going to be a long, busy night.


End file.
